Contact Me!

About Me

A long-time librarian, I am mostly of Polish, Acadian, and French-Canadian descent. I have started this blog to share and acquire genealogical knowledge, achieve inner peace, and perhaps realize my ultimate quest, to find two ancestors with the same surname who actually spelled their surnames exactly the same way...

This Blog is Dedicated...

"To live in the hearts of those we leave behind is not to die." ~ Thomas Campbell (1777-1844)

Names I'm Researching

Bielski

Bulak

Chenette

Comeau

Federic

Girouard

Janiszak

Kowalewski

LaCroix

Ladd

Larivierre

Motyka

Radziewicz

Shenette

Suchocka

Szerejko

Touchette

Waczkowski

Places I'm Researching

Holyoke, MA

Worcester, MA

Herkimer County, NY

Buffalo, NY

Shenandoah, PA

St. Albans, VT

St-Denis, Quebec

St-Ours, Quebec

Stuckley, Quebec

Goworowo, Poland

Kepno, Poland

Suwalki, Poland

Szczawin, Poland

Warsaw, Poland

Zdynia, Poland

Copyright Statement

Content and original images are the property of the author and blog owner, Cynthia Shenette, and may not be used in their entirety or in part without permission.

You may NOT use the contents of this site for commercial purposes without explicit permission from Cynthia Shenette. Commercial purposes includes blogs with ads and income generating features, and/or blogs or sites using feed content as a replacement for original content. Full or partial content usage is not permitted.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Harvey Ball and World Smile Day - Tombstone Tuesday

(Original Image and Text, Copyright (c) 2011 Cynthia Shenette) I decided to post a photo of Harvey Ross Ball's gravestone in honor of World Smile Day which is on October 7, 2011. Worcester native Harvey Ball was a commercial artist and the original designer of the smiley face. If you think Mr. Ball made a huge profit off of the smiley we all know and love, you are wrong. Mr. Ball never copyrighted or trademarked his smiley and was paid the princely sum of $45 in 1963 for his work. By all accounts Mr. Ball never regretted his decision, and was a goodwill ambassador embodying the true spirit of his iconic symbol. Smile!

My Dad sold insurance on Main Street in Worcester. He knew Mr. Ball from the Chamber of Commerce or some other business men's group in Worcester. Dad always had a box of his original smiley buttons on his desk, and made sure that the box on his secretaries desk was well stocked. I remember having dozens of them growing up- and we used them as markers for games, dishes for Barbies, and decorated our curtains!